Nightmare of the Dead: Rise of the Zombies by Vincenzo Bilof Read Free Book Online Page B

hands. The doctor leapt into the air once again.
    "What're you doing? The supply is limited!"
    Santiago shook his head. "It's time to see if this is what you say it is. If I'm immune, then the woman's life is forfeit. We won't need her to finish the war. She didn't change back, Doctor Lynch. She's not the woman she used to be. The damage is irreversible."
    "Let's talk with her, first! Give me a chance…!"
    Bannan watched as the jar in Santiago's hands seemed to glow and pulsate with green, swirling energy. She could see the killer's narrow, slow-blinking eyes by the energized light, and she knew exactly what was going to happen next.
    Doctor Lynch roared as the jar was lifted into the air and slammed down o nto the ground. Its contents rolled and spilled into a cloud that seemed to funnel and then lift, spiraling and spreading as if directed by a sadistic deity that desired the wailing cries of suffering humans in the mortal realm. Bannan ground her teeth and straightened her shoulders as the benevolent mist once again enchanted her vision, coloring everything in the green light.
    The doctor immediately fled to his carriage and ordered the driver to begin the escape. Santiago stepped directly into the flooding tendrils that coalesced over his ears, around his neck, and around the officer's sword at his hip, lifting and flowing over his shoulders and hat.
    Several men inhaled the mist and collapsed upon their knees, others rushed toward their tethered horses, though their helpless gazes couldn't help but wander back to their tortured comrades. McPhee also ran to the horses.
    As the carriages turned around, Santiago closed his eyes and breathed deeply. He stared at the men who coughed and writhed upon the ground, their bodies enslaved by violent seizures that rattled their bones and forced blood from between their lips. He lifted one of his guns—Bannan quickly ducked back into the shadows before she could be shot. The blast rang out, and more gunfire followed. Damn it! She had a chance to shoot him, and instead, she had watched the horror show.
    She quickly raced around the buildings to get to the horses. Santiago had re-focused his attention on his twitching men, forgetting about horses and his own vulnerability. The scene riveted him, and he couldn't help but observe the screams of pain. They begged him to shoot them dead while they clawed at their throats and crawled through the dirt toward him, reaching out for his boots. One man prayed while gurgling and choking on his own blood. Likenesses bubbled and melted.
    "It burns!"
    "Hail Mary, full of grace… argh …the pain…the agony , please God, please…"
    "Kill me. Please kill me."
    McPhee managed to dislodge a man from the horses and began to batter him about the face with the butt of a pistol. The horses neighed and reared up.
    "Leave with me!" Doctor Lynch shrieked as the second carriage paused momentarily before leaving Cedar Rock. Santiago shot his glare in the doctor's direction as if he had been shaken from a dream. He ran to the carriage and leapt into the back as the green mist began to rise up into the night to obscure the stars.
    The doctor fled into the night with Santiago and whatever mysteries they withheld.
    A group of horses galloped off into the darkness, accidentally released while McPhee struggled with one of the mercenaries. The mist surrounded him , but his body refused to suffer the transformation.
    The spy stood helplessly and watched as burning flesh collected at the feet of a former man. McPhee's entire body quivered, his arms were locked at his sides, and his mouth hung open. The outlaw he had been fighting with vomited a stream of blood until the gore seemed to explode through his nose, ears, and eyes. The man's screams intensified until the vocal chords seemed to stretch beyond human limits. Smoke drifted from the burning piles of flesh that pooled beneath the dying man. 
    The transformed beast stood and shook as an assortment of organs